I haven’t been to a children’s birthday party since I was myself a child. If there was ever any rationale to counter the decision to start a family, the parental burden of the middle-class weekly kids’ party pilgrimage would be sufficient to bring the western demographic to its knees.
There are reasons many people want children - I’ve never claimed to understand them, but let’s assume it’s something that’s considered desirable, at least initially, even if it’s just to get the mother in law off one’s back or to meet some religious requirement.
Observing family life through the [slightly smug] solo living and child-free lens, I feel I need to capture some of the massive sacrifices that people would surely have known about before signing up to the having kids thing, but went ahead anyway. I guess biology may help people to rationalise those insanities. Thankfully I felt an innate need to avoid having children for as long as I can remember, for which I give infinite gratitude. Gratitude when I witness the carefully concealed boredom, the always-on, timetabled existence of parents.
I opened on kids’ parties, so let’s delve a little more there.
The number of parties is equally astonishing and alarming, and there doesn’t even seem to be an option to not go, or to conduct them after school these days, which means every weekend of a parent’s life will be committed to children’s birthday parties. And apparently it’s not acceptable just to drop the kid off to enjoy themselves so you can go and do something more useful or enjoyable. Nope. You make yourself available for the virtue-signalling handing out the celery-cut into-fun-shapes sticks (though if you’re lucky enough to mix in working class circles, at least you can procure a few of the fizzy sweets doing the rounds).
I didn’t mention the party bags, but apparently deciding what should go into one to outdo the last party host can bring on panic attacks.
Always-on
Any parent you speak to, particularly mums, have committed to memory a timetable of their children’s monthly commitments, available to recall on demand to anyone making the mistake of asking how things are going. After hearing all about the logistical requirements to get child A to ballet, breakfast club, holiday clubs, swimming, extra swimming, horse riding, football practice etc, then we learn all about child B who’s at a different school and needs picking up by so and so’s mum who’s taking them somewhere else afterwards because thingy has to work late. What a bore fest for everyone. And it’s all said with one aim in mind, which is to simply ensure that everyone knows just how busy and virtuous they are, particularly compared to you, you content child-free individual with an interesting life freak! They haven’t even asked how you are doing…
And we haven’t even started on the ‘Play dates’, a term that revolts me though I’m not sure why. For many of us belonging to a certain era, this is essentially going to your mate’s house to have your tea and see what their room is like, maybe having a sleep over. Arrangements were made between the kids (‘do you wanna come to mine this Saturday?’) not the parents. Now it’s simply an opportunity for parents to arrange for their children to be minded by someone else, postponing the inevitable return of the favour to a time in the diary when ‘I’m simply not so exhausted!’ And boy, parents will tell you how tired the are, the scale sliding upwards per additional family member.
Back in my day…
I don’t recall parenting seeming so much of a burden back in the day. Kids went to school and they came home and did their homework. They might play out after tea. That seemed to be it. Kids were much more self sufficient then. Now it’s ‘organised fun’ all the way. 14 hour day commitments. This modern self-inflicted position of not being a good parent unless you’re burned out is wholly alien and irritating. And how are kids responding to this kind of lifestyle? Anxiety, and behavioural-related issues often diagnosed with other more medically official terms.
I use the kids party and social committments schedule as just a couple of examples of why having children is so undesirable to me, but they really point to more existential thinking on what it means to be truly happy, such as:
The having children experience means you are no longer in control of your own destiny, which means you are giving up your freedom, for almost ever;
And similarly, you lose autonomy over your physical body if you are a woman bearing children, and for some time afterwards too;
The cost of children generally means you will need to make multiple sacrifices on your own hopes and opportunities;
The kids’ interests and activities will always need to come before your own;
Holidays will usually have to be spent with other people’s children because adults-only is out;
Time to oneself will also be in short supply. Time to sit and think, time to write something that isn’t for the parents’ what’s app group, or planning the next school fair, sports day or fundraiser is likely to be unavailable;
Having that after-work drink is out too if you’ve got to pick the kids up, cook for the kids, or sew them a costume for the latest whatever at school;
Spontaneity - it’s unlikely parents have this word much in their vocabulary
The burden of responsibility will almost always be with parents, a burden to stay together with a partner you grew out of years ago, or always having that legal connection with someone you’d rather forget entirely, long after you spilt with them;
The commitment doesn’t end after the children have reached adulthood - you can’t be sure when or if you will ever be that coveted empty nester, whether in the physical home, or in the provision of free 24/7 emotional support;
Did I mention the potential grandkids you may also become responsible for in some way later down the line?
I’d be interested to understand the reward side of having kids - you can put a lot in for a long time, but what do you get out of it? Something to talk about with other friends who have kids? That sense of fitting in and towing the social line? Or is it that it’s not so much about personal reward, but duty. The obedient social and biological driver. Not.being.selfish.
Selfish
That word. It’s banded about a bit as far as childless people are concerned, unless you are infertile and then you’re only considered not selfish if you decide reluctantly to divulge this information, just to avoid being inaccurately labelled. If you’re single, then others will mistakenly assume that you haven’t made the decision for yourself, and if you could just meet someone, all would be restored in the world order.
Nobody I know without children regret the outcome or live empty lives, quite the contrary, and with more flexibility, choices and money.
So how will us child-free types be spending our lives? Anecdotally, I was at a funeral and was accosted by another attendee who was keen to know more about me, I assume because she didn’t get out much herself. From a rural part of Ireland, this lady simply couldn’t understand how I spent my time. I didn’t have children, I wasn’t married, I wasn’t part of a social club and I didn’t have a dog. I must do something she told me.
I have the advantage and disadvantage of appearing slightly younger than I am so it seems to give unspoken permission to others to say anything they like to me as they’re the adult and I’m the impressionable child. A funeral isn’t the right time to give someone a verbal slap as such, so she got away with that one, but at the time I was actually holding down an incredibly tough job in London with an equally gruelling commute. I worked hard so I could reap the benefits later, and those options were opened up completely because I didn’t have children. So that’s what I did lady.
I was once also told that it must be so great for me on a Sunday morning to wake up and just have a bit of toast in bed, because this is obviously what all people without children want to do. The reality is much better: an early morning run, getting my cleaning out the way so I can catch that afternoon film, a cheeky glass of wine with friends or the new course I signed up for. What a presumption to suggest that child-free people do not have busy timetables of their own. We often do, just with much more meaningful, enjoyable, valuable and self-driven content.
What I love about not having had kids
I am spontaneous and hedonistic;
I have changed my life several times at will;
I give myself permission to be unreliable and inconsistent with the low level things that don’t matter because no-one’s judging;
I travel to places I want to go and I can go on my own without checking in with other people;
I can make plans that only include me;
I can take up a course, spend time learning when I want to;
I can choose when I do exercise and exercise I enjoy;
I can spend the money I earn on me to do all of the above and more;
I can role model positive child-free behaviours to help people who are having doubts about starting a family to make the choices they really want to make, were it not for the stigma of being childless (or in my world, child-free);
I can essentially do Anything.
The inevitable run-out-of-other-arguments conclusion for pro-having-kids advocates is, who will look after you when you’re old? My counter position is that I might not reach old age, and even if I did, that I wouldn’t expect children I’d given life to to take care of me as an old duffer. That’s called not being selfish btw.
And a final thought for now
I want nothing more for children than for them to feel protected, happy and cared for. I don’t dislike them, but I don’t want any of my own because I know my heart isn’t in it and I would feel resentful. This post is really about being open and to add to those voices which are beginning to change perspectives about living meaningful lives and making positive contributions in different ways. It doesn’t denote any kind of political or ideological bias, at least not in me- I’m quite old fashioned in many ways, so for anyone saying not having kids is a new age trend doomed or intentionally contrived to reduce our population to nought, that’s simply not it. There will always be children and parents who love them, it’s just acknowledging that similarly there have always been a small proportion of people who didn’t want children yet felt duty bound to have them. Now there are more options and a growing [albeit very slow] acceptance for it, so hoorah.
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